The Gencom team is dynamic, vibrant, entrepreneurial and focused, and is made up of industry leaders which bring a wealth of experience successfully navigating through several business cycles. Gencom’s executive team brings an average of over 25 years of industry experience and, coupled with senior leadership, an average of over 10 years’ experience with the firm.

Founder & Principal

Karim Alibhai

Karim Alibhai

Karim Alibhai has more than 30 years of experience in the hospitality industry. As principal of Gencom, Mr. Alibhai oversees all investment activity for the company he founded in 1987, including acquisitions, ground-up development, re-positionings, partial and full exits from investments, and capital market activities.

Through Mr. Alibhai’s vision and leadership, Gencom has consistently achieved results that have outperformed industry standards. Mr. Alibhai has led the company in some of the most successful luxury hotel and residential development ventures throughout the United States with more than $3.0 billion in funding from large institutional investors and lenders such as Lehman Brothers, Goldman Sachs, Invesco, Credit Suisse First Boston, Wells Fargo, Carey Watermark, and MetLife, to boutique and opportunistic funds. Gencom’s extensive transactional track record spans throughout the Americas, Europe and the Caribbean. Gencom has participated in more than 150 hotel transactions over the past 30 years.

In 1995, through Mr. Alibhai, Gencom co-sponsored the initial public offering of Patriot American, the largest IPO of a hospitality REIT to be consummated at the time. From 2000 through 2016, Gencom developed or acquired nine Ritz- Carlton and seven Marriott properties, as well as a Four Seasons property and similar brands, most with significant hospitality real estate development and sales components.

Through its various affiliates and partnerships, Gencom and Karim Alibhai hold significant ownership interests in numerous hospitality and residential related projects. Currently, Mr. Alibhai has the company focused on the acquisition, development, and operation of luxury mixed-use hotels, including Ritz-Carlton, Four Seasons, Rosewood, and Hyatt properties, with ancillary residential components in key resort and urban domestic and international markets, as well as growth of Gencom’s hospitality management services company investment, Benchmark Hospitality International.

Gencom is headquartered in Miami with a regional office in Houston.

Mr. Alibhai holds a Bachelor of Arts in Economics from Rice University. He has served on the boards for Wyndham International, Interstate Hotels, and Benchmark. He lives in Coral Gables with his four children.

Executive Team

Tom Bezold

Tom Bezold

EVP, Chief Financial Officer

Julie Levitt

Julie Levitt

EVP, General Counsel

Alessandro E. Colantonio

Alessandro E. Colantonio

EVP, Chief Investment Officer

Gary Lake

Gary Lake

EVP, Asset management

Donald McGregor

Donald McGregor

EVP, Managing Director - Latin America

Senior Management

Andres Alfonso

Andres Alfonso

SVP, Accounting & Reporting

Peter Trujillo

Peter Trujillo

SVP, Corporate Investments

Blythe Pierre-Louis

Blythe Pierre-Louis

SVP, Capital Markets

Gary Crocker

Gary Crocker

SVP, Construction

John Hogan

John Hogan

SVP, Architecture & Construction

Kenda Bailey

Kenda Bailey

SVP, Design & Procurement

Laurens Fuchs

Laurens Fuchs

SVP, Asset Management

Ignasi Puig

Ignasi Puig

SVP, Acquisitions & Investments

Steven Pita

Steven Pita

Corporate Controller